Service ship â much less kidnap its brawn.
Dispassionately Helva took account of the matter of Kiraâs departure. The girl had, in the extremes of grief, sought death. But Helva doubted Kira would betray her service. For one thing, she couldnât, although the Aliothites didnât realize the ship was capable of independent thought and action. Having enticed the brawn away, they assumed the ship was grounded, impotent, and they could take their time forcing Kira to accede to their designs on the embryos.
I could just leave, Helva thought. If death is the reward these zealots seek, then I donât need to have any compunctions about burning the guard detail to its due merits. But I cannot leave Kira. Not yet. I have time. What was the matter with Cencom? They were never around when you needed them! And why in the name of little apples did they permit Kira to land on adeath-dedicated planet? You idiot, Helva told herself, because they didnât know thatâs the way the religion turned.
The ground rumbled beneath her. Far to the north a fireball zoomed heavenward, bursting in a shower of lighted fragments. Other fireworks followed, as well as more ominous movement beneath Helvaâs tailfins. She held herself ready for an instant liftoff if her balance was shaken beyond the normal recovery in her stabilizers. Somewhere to the northeast, another volcano answered the eruption of the first.
Helva saw the ground car carrying Kira reach the central building and she muttered ineffective mental commands for Kira to snap out of her trance and switch on the contact button.
The guard, impervious to the massed eruptions, went right on trying to force the lift mechanism. Their cowls kept falling from their faces and they kept replacing them as if a bare face were indecent. The red light from the fireballs that continued to light the sky illuminated gaunt, ascetic faces, dirty with ingrained volcanic dusts, dull-eyed from improper nutrition and continual fatigue.
Kira alighted from the transport and, flanked by guards, was escorted to a smaller vehicle that disappeared from Helvaâs augmented vision into the complex of city buildings. The transport turned back to the field and Helva.
An enterprising guard urged his fellows to bring a gantry rig against the ship. Slowly andwith much effort, they wheeled the cumbersome frame from a far side of the field.
Helva watched the performance with grim amusement. Their own fault for insisting we set down so far from the facilities of the port. Perhaps they couldnât see in the gloom of Aliothâs perpetual twilight that the lock was closed tight, too.
She tried to rouse Cencom on the tight beam, cursing at that delay because she was so worried about not reaching Kira on the contact.
âContact button,â she muttered to herself, recalling the anomalous appearance of one on Nonethâs hood. Now, if it were a Service issue or a true imitation, she ought to be able to use it. That Temple female had utilized one to second Nonethâs commands to Kira.
Helva wasted no time in throwing open the wide-wave on the contact band. As hastily, she closed it, dazed with the resultant chaotic kaleidoscope of sight and sound that besieged her. Mentally reeling from the impact on her senses, she wondered painfully how she had managed to get several hundred thousand contacts at once. Quickly she scanned the scurrying guards, still trying to wrestle the gantry frame to her. Each one had a button securing his hood at the neck.
âGreat glittering galaxies,â moaned Helva. âThis religion must be composed of schizoids to deal with that kind of chaos.â
Holding tightly to her sanity, Helva openedthe band a fraction, wincing, at the confusion of sound and sight. She tried to focus in on one contact alone but felt herself drowning in the myriad pictures that returned. It was like trying to focus on a pinpoint through the faceting of a flyâs
Dispassionately Helva took account of the matter of Kiraâs departure. The girl had, in the extremes of grief, sought death. But Helva doubted Kira would betray her service. For one thing, she couldnât, although the Aliothites didnât realize the ship was capable of independent thought and action. Having enticed the brawn away, they assumed the ship was grounded, impotent, and they could take their time forcing Kira to accede to their designs on the embryos.
I could just leave, Helva thought. If death is the reward these zealots seek, then I donât need to have any compunctions about burning the guard detail to its due merits. But I cannot leave Kira. Not yet. I have time. What was the matter with Cencom? They were never around when you needed them! And why in the name of little apples did they permit Kira to land on adeath-dedicated planet? You idiot, Helva told herself, because they didnât know thatâs the way the religion turned.
The ground rumbled beneath her. Far to the north a fireball zoomed heavenward, bursting in a shower of lighted fragments. Other fireworks followed, as well as more ominous movement beneath Helvaâs tailfins. She held herself ready for an instant liftoff if her balance was shaken beyond the normal recovery in her stabilizers. Somewhere to the northeast, another volcano answered the eruption of the first.
Helva saw the ground car carrying Kira reach the central building and she muttered ineffective mental commands for Kira to snap out of her trance and switch on the contact button.
The guard, impervious to the massed eruptions, went right on trying to force the lift mechanism. Their cowls kept falling from their faces and they kept replacing them as if a bare face were indecent. The red light from the fireballs that continued to light the sky illuminated gaunt, ascetic faces, dirty with ingrained volcanic dusts, dull-eyed from improper nutrition and continual fatigue.
Kira alighted from the transport and, flanked by guards, was escorted to a smaller vehicle that disappeared from Helvaâs augmented vision into the complex of city buildings. The transport turned back to the field and Helva.
An enterprising guard urged his fellows to bring a gantry rig against the ship. Slowly andwith much effort, they wheeled the cumbersome frame from a far side of the field.
Helva watched the performance with grim amusement. Their own fault for insisting we set down so far from the facilities of the port. Perhaps they couldnât see in the gloom of Aliothâs perpetual twilight that the lock was closed tight, too.
She tried to rouse Cencom on the tight beam, cursing at that delay because she was so worried about not reaching Kira on the contact.
âContact button,â she muttered to herself, recalling the anomalous appearance of one on Nonethâs hood. Now, if it were a Service issue or a true imitation, she ought to be able to use it. That Temple female had utilized one to second Nonethâs commands to Kira.
Helva wasted no time in throwing open the wide-wave on the contact band. As hastily, she closed it, dazed with the resultant chaotic kaleidoscope of sight and sound that besieged her. Mentally reeling from the impact on her senses, she wondered painfully how she had managed to get several hundred thousand contacts at once. Quickly she scanned the scurrying guards, still trying to wrestle the gantry frame to her. Each one had a button securing his hood at the neck.
âGreat glittering galaxies,â moaned Helva. âThis religion must be composed of schizoids to deal with that kind of chaos.â
Holding tightly to her sanity, Helva openedthe band a fraction, wincing, at the confusion of sound and sight. She tried to focus in on one contact alone but felt herself drowning in the myriad pictures that returned. It was like trying to focus on a pinpoint through the faceting of a flyâs
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